


A Man Describes a Kiss

by Cat_Latin



Series: Chosen Family [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M, His Last Vow Spoilers, M/M, Missing Scene, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-05
Updated: 2014-02-05
Packaged: 2018-01-11 05:52:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1169470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cat_Latin/pseuds/Cat_Latin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perhaps madness left him enamoured with all of them, to some extent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Man Describes a Kiss

 

 

 

Sherlock avoided Bart's, and the wrath of Molly for as long as he could. Finally, he could stay away no longer, and crept into the lab one early morning, to better examine some unidentifiable residue found on a Jane Doe.

Molly appeared in his periphery. Of late, and by his own design, there had been a remarkable lack of Molly in his life, and why should that upset him _now,_ when she was right next to him? Sherlock fiddled with the microscope, and took a slow, steady breath. Molly said nothing, and worked silently, almost within arms reach, for twenty-two minutes.

Finally, he ventured, “You look well. Haven't seen you since John requested I urinate into a cup. _For Science._ ” He couldn't prevent the edge to his voice.

She suddenly pulled her gloves off with a snap, and Sherlock flinched at the sound, and the motion he tracked from the corner of his eye. Molly was at his side, and he expected a fresh round of slaps. Her small, unusually steady hand merely grasped his chin, and turned his face to hers.

Molly regarded him with peaceful eyes, and told him, in her quiet, practical, most competent voice: “I have access to the industrial digester we use to dissolve the research cadavers, once we've finished with them. Three to five hours, Sherlock, to reduce an entire human being to a few litres of something the consistency of mineral oil, with a bit of powder on the side,”

Molly slowed down as she explained the process in detail with precise, familiar enunciation, and he realized she was mocking him, actually _mocking him to his face_ , he thought keenly, and why should that raise his spirits, almost excite him?

“And if you ever poison your beautiful brain again,” Molly concluded, “I will _disappear_ you.” Sherlock was enthralled. In his absence, this clever but timid creature had grown teeth. Molly's hand slid to the back of his neck, and she pulled him down for a kiss. He stiffened a moment, then relaxed into it, curious and trusting, allowing it. Molly explored his mouth for several minutes, then pulled back just enough to murmur against his lips, “Don't worry. I'm just trying it on.”

Sherlock forgot to breathe for a moment, and mentally flailed for a response. He settled on something darkly humorous, and deadpan. “Doctor Hooper, are you trying to turn me on? With the industrial digester, I mean.”

“I am most definitely _not_ ,” she replied evenly, stepping away a bit more, but remaining in his space, looking in his eyes. A smile threatened to break out on her face.

“Good lord, _'Doctor Hooper,'”_ Sherlock repeated aloud to himself. He looked at her incredulously. “That's actually your name. Out loud, it sounds like a children's television show character. I was trying to demonstrate respect for your expertise by using the appropriate honorific, but I believe I'll stick with Molly, if it's all the same to you.”

Molly laughed, and he covered his relief by offering to fetch coffee, though he had to return, both sheepish and annoyed, because he hadn't a clue where she'd gone to fetch his cups, all of those times.

 

They went out for lunch, and Molly chatted, while Sherlock watched her across the table from behind a mask of quiet attention, feeling unmoored. He reflected on the details of their history, and came to an astonishing conclusion: what he was seeing in Molly appeared to be all the physical signs of quiet, unconditional love.

He hoped he wasn't straining it, by asking another favor. He asked anyway.

“You want to get back into my bedroom?” Molly asked.

“I refer to these locations I choose as bolt-holes, but yes, I'd like to rekindle the arrangement we had before I died.”

“Rekindle,” Molly repeated. She leaned in. “If you want to use my bedroom as your Bat Cave again, there will be rules. Number one: I'm done pining. But I'd still fuck you.” She kept her eyes on his face, and pretended not to notice him squirm in his chair a bit. She'd toyed with him like this before, with...Tim?

“Don't worry,” Molly said. “I know you're spoken for, even if you don't yet. You just need to remain at peace with knowing it.”

“Agreed,” Sherlock said.

“Number two: you will not test any drugs on me. I know you're cooking up some kind of sleeping potion with that Wiggins character. That shit doesn't come near me. _Ever_.” She looked daggers at Sherlock, and he swallowed, and nodded. “You will simply ask me for what you need, and I'll provide it. Like you know I can. Like I _have already_. Are we understood?”

They were understood.

Molly had moved beyond her infatuation with Sherlock, but still loved him, apparently. Her fiance...Tim? No, Tom, she'd left him in her wake. Tom wasn't a sociopath; Molly was simply finished. Sherlock felt strangely proud of her, and opened his mouth to tell her, but something made him stop. Possibly Not Good. He paid for lunch instead, and kissed her cheek as he left.

 

Not long after, Mrs. Morstan-Watson put a bullet in Sherlock's body, and life became painfully interesting for a while.

In the weeks of Sherlock's recovery, he saw a lot of John and Mary, but almost always separately. When they were together, they functioned at the basic level of civility, behaving as flatmates who happened to regularly visit the obstetrician together. They moved around one-another in cautious, almost-silence.

Mary came to Baker Street alone. She sat in John's chair, looking golden in the afternoon sun that streamed through the sitting-room windows. She was quietly weeping, and disgusted with herself at the same time, muttering about the hormones getting the best of her.

Sherlock thought of what to do. It wasn't yet sixteen weeks, but he had read some interesting research that suggested foetal hearing developed sooner. He sat on the floor, a little gingerly, as his midsection was still healing, at Mary's feet, reading Shakespeare to her abdomen. Mary stopped crying, and fell into a doze, when he read as Oberon.

The tiny creature growing inside Mary would be the size of a plum, about now. Secretly, he named the child Peaseblossom Sherlock Morstan-Watson, and filed the gilded birth certificate in his mind in the appropriate box, mahogany, with brass inlay, with all his other secret names for things. Inspired, he went and broke into his parents home when he knew they'd be away. He climbed to the attic, and dismantled the cradle that was used for both he and Mycroft, and quietly assembled it in the upstairs bedroom at Baker Street.

When Mary noticed, he got a little squeal, and a lingering kiss on the corner of his mouth. Her breath was sweet, and she smelled of citrus. No more Claire de la Lune.

When John noticed, on a separate visit, he received a pleased, almost shy thank you.

“You've done so much, what can I do?” John asked quietly. They were in the upstairs bedroom, John near the cradle, Sherlock hovering near the doorway.

Sherlock witnessed the array of emotions on his friend's tired, beautiful face, opened his mouth, and lost his mind.

“A kiss?”

When John hesitated, Sherlock added, “Don't leave me guessing. You could scar me for life.”

More hesitation, accompanied by raised eyebrows, and Sherlock nearly shouted, “Oh, come on! How is waltzing easier than a kiss?”

This surprised a laugh out of his friend. John stepped closer to Sherlock. “Are we joking about how fucked up we all are now?”

“Why not?”

“Just checking.” John moved closer still, and Sherlock stepped back instinctively, until he was against the wall. John asked him, “Is this one my fault, too?”

“Nope. I'm to blame for this one. It's all over the media: bohemian, addictive personality, can't be trusted, could be dangerous.”

John leaned into Sherlock, pressing him to the wall with his body. His hands slid up Sherlock's arms, gripping his biceps. “Anything else comes out of your face-hole that's from the blog, or the papers, or that has a bloody _hashtag_ \--”

“That actually limits our conversations significantly.”

“It does, doesn't it? Fine. Then it's all fine. Can you also be fine, with it all being fine?"

“Oh that was awful,” Sherlock marveled. “And you said _fucked up_ ,” he enunciated thoroughly, “and here I am.”

“Right, enough of that,” John said, looking at Sherlock's lips. He lifted his face, and Sherlock lowered his, to receive the requested kiss.

Their mouths fit together perfectly, warm, and as soft as he remembered. Sherlock couldn't prevent a satisfied hum from escaping his throat. John's hands traveled up Sherlock's shoulders, to his neck, his fingers tangling in Sherlock's hair. Sherlock's hands wandered under John's jumper, to the bare skin on his back.

Their lips came apart slowly, and they rested together, brow to brow.

“There's still lots to sort out,” John said.

“I know.” Sherlock cleared his throat. “I have another request.”

“Tell me.”

“Come to my parents for Christmas.” John's eyes widened in surprise. Sherlock added, “I'm asking Mary as well.”

John stiffened. Sherlock pulled him to his chest, and wrapped his arms around him. Mouth to John's ear, he said, “Please.” After a moment, John relaxed in his arms, and nodded.

It was a magic word, after all.


End file.
